


good luck charm

by winterfire22



Category: IT (2017)
Genre: M/M, Munchhausen by proxy syndrome, Oblivious Eddie Kaspbrak, Pining Richie Tozier, Reddie, Underage Drinking, but idk if its before or after lol, but its linear and stuff, but just go with it ok i wanted to write a cute friend vacation fic, but like also they're kids so this is NOT shippy, honestly the whole concept of eddie's mom letting him go at all is kinda unrealistic, i would call this pre-shippy, it's just them bein buds and richie having pre-romantic feelings maybe, mentions of eddie's mom abusing him, shifting perspective between the two bc thats how i roll, takes place around the time of 2017 movie, teen boys making gross jokes, this is more little snippets from the trip than it is a straight up narrative, vacation shenanigans, very medium portrayal of richie's parents, you better believe it took hours for eddie to convince his mom to let him go
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-18
Updated: 2019-08-18
Packaged: 2020-09-07 00:31:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20300497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/winterfire22/pseuds/winterfire22
Summary: richie doesn’t wanna go to the family lake cabin with his parents. he’ll be too bored, dammit. he wants to stay at home and play with his friends. the compromise? mr. and mrs. tozier allow him to invite 1 (one) friend to come with. it’s vacation time baby, we’re inner tubing, we're swimming, we’re making s’mores, we’re stealing dad’s beer.





	good luck charm

The Tozier family car skips over the bumpy, unkempt highways of rural Maine. Worry pulling his eyebrows together, Eddie looks out the window. Watches the trees go by. The few other cars. The sun is low in the sky, since they’d had to wait for Richie’s parents to finish the Friday work day before even leaving Derry. 

"What the hell are these?" Richie's voice comes from the other side of the back seat. Eddie turns toward him. He’s crinkling plastic, with no care about how loud it is.

"Language, Richie," says his mother. Both boys ignore it.

"It's bags," Eddie answers, his brown eyes wide and very serious. 

"Why do you need like a million bags? Are you collecting shit? Are you gonna collect lake specimens for some nerd thing? Are you gonna put them in nerd cases and bring then for show and tell?" Clumsily, Richie shoves his chunky glasses back into place.

"No, you dummy, they're throw up bags," Eddie says, crossing his thin arms over his striped tee shirt.

"You gonna blow chunks?" Richie asks, almost sounding excited.

"I hope not but I had to bring them just in case. Really, you should be thanking me that I wasn't going to throw up all over you and get you sick with my throw up germs."

Eddie takes the wad of bags from Richie. Oddly enough-- and for the first time in his relatively short and sparsely road-tripped life-- he doesn't feel car sick at all. It's weird. But he'll take it.

"If you feel sick, we can pull over," Richie's dad sighs from the driver's seat.

"No thanks Mr. Tozier I feel fine," Eddie says quickly.

"You feel fine now, seeen-yor, but not for long, not when I get a hold of you,” Richie says, doing what he thinks is a very good ‘character’ but what is, in actuality, nothing.

“It isn’t funny,” Eddie insists. “Motion sickness is a serious thing, Richie. If you puke too much you get dehydrated and then you pass out. Do you want me to pass out? Then you’d have to take me to a hospital and I’d maybe die. And my mom would be so mad. You know, she only agreed to let me come here because I forfeited a month of allowance. She would take any excuse to make me come home.”

(i miss her, eddie can’t help but think; mama)

“She doesn’t have to know anything,” Richie says defiantly.

“She’d find out,” Eddie says.

“You wanna play I Spy?” Richie asks.

“Okay.”

“I spy something dumb.”

“Something dumb? You can’t just say something dumb. You have to say something about it.”

“Fine. I spy something dumb that has a fanny pack between his dumb feet.”

Eddie huffs and turns away, watching them turn off the highway and onto a rural forest road. “I don’t wanna play with you if you’re gonna call me dumb. That’s mean. Don’t be an asshole.”

“Language,” Richie’s mom chimes in from the front seat again.

“Sorry Mrs. Tozier.”

“Fine, fine,” Richie says, tugging on Eddie’s arm. “I spy something orange.”

Eddie holds up the orange bottle of prescription nausea pills his mom had insisted he take. “You’re so bad at this it’s not even funny.”

“If I’m so bad at it, it’s your turn now,” Richie says, doing a weird Darth Vader impression.

“Okay. Uh…” Eddie looks around. “I spy with my little eye…” He looks around the car. “A choking hazard.”

Eddie can see it on Richie’s face; he wants to say something gross about his private parts. But since his parents are in the car, he appears to decide otherwise. “The candy?” He suggests, holding up the few pieces of candy his mother had allowed him to bring for the car ride. Hard candy to keep his mouth full so he would stop talking for at least a few minutes, probably. 

“No.”

“The keys?”

Eddie shakes his head, a small smile edging its way onto his lips. “No.”

“The cap on the pen my mom keeps in her purse?”

“How would I know your mom keeps a pen in her purse?” Eddie asks.

“Fine. What color is it?” Richie asks, tugging on his seatbelt.

“Brown and black.”

“Is it you?”

Eddie almost looks offended. “How am I a choking hazard? I’m not brown and black.”

“Your eyes are brown and your hair is black,” Richie argues, even though Eddie’s hair is more of a dark brown than black. “I don’t know. You’re bad at this game.”

“You’re bad at the game. You can’t even guess!”

“Fine,” Richie says in a bad British accent. “What is it you’re discussing, my good sir?”

Eddie leans down and picks up a single loose battery off the floor of the car.

“I couldn’t even see that!” Richie shouts.

“Richie, keep your voice down while we’re in the car,” his dad says from the driver’s seat.

Both boys ignore it easily. “I thought you could see it,” Eddie insists.

“You were holding your foot over it on purpose!”

“I was not.”

“Yes you were!”

“No,” Eddie says with the kind of serious finality he sometimes has. Richie stops arguing. Eddie wouldn’t lie to him, anyway.

A few moments later, as the summer sun is going down, the four of them pull up to the cabin. It’s a small, overgrown thing that looks like it was made from trees cut down right then and there, set back into the forest a few dozen feet from the water’s edge. As they start lugging duffel bags and bags of groceries inside, the dust hits Eddie’s nose hard. He sets down his bag and unsteadily unzips his fanny pack for his inhaler, his hand already starting to shake a little from the worry that comes with needing it and not having it immediately ready. But he finds it within a few seconds, and takes a puff. 

“Puff puff, bitch,” Richie mutters at him as he walks past.

“If I don’t use this thing I could die,” Eddie insists as he puts it away and picks his bag back up. “D’you want me to die?”

“Course not, Eddie Spaghetti. Then who would I inner tube with?”

“What?”

“Inner tubing,” Richie says.

“What is that?”

“Our room’s this way by the kitchen. It’s when you go on a blow-up thing on a rope attached to a boat and you go over waves and stuff. It’s fun.”

(he doesn’t sound convinced)

“Oh,” Eddie says. “That sounds really dangerous.”

“It’s not. If you fall off you just go in the water.”

“Oh.”

They make it into the room, which is cramped and sparsely furnished with bunk beds and a dresser. “I’m on top!” Richie shouts, already climbing the splinter-y, unstable-looking ladder.

“Whatever,” says Eddie, who is secretly a tiny bit relieved. There’s no rail around the bed or anything. A kid could easily roll off and get a concussion. Mostly just for something to do, Eddie sits down on the bottom bunk and starts taking inventory of the medicine his mother had packed for him; cough medicine; anti-diarrhea tablets; iron supplements; aspirin; an EpiPen of course, in case he comes into contact with an angry bee; his various prescriptions, nausea medicine for the hours-long car trips, allergy medication in case there was bad pollen; then of course a whole stock of bandaids and alcohol wipes and a roll of gauze, just in case. And two bottles of sunscreen in case the first runs out. It’s risky business, sending a little boy like you away to the forest with someone else’s parents, his mother had told him. He feels a spike of anxiety. He’s never been away from her. He’s never been out of Derry for more than a couple days. This is almost a whole week.

“Are you boys all set to go to bed?” Richie’s mom asks, appearing in the doorway.

“Sure, Mrs. Tozier,” Eddie says with a nod.

“We’re fine, mom.”

She nods. “Within the hour, I don’t want to hear another peep out of you, got it? It’s almost nine.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Richie says dismissively. She leaves, closing the door behind her.

“Your mom lets you stay up until ten?” Eddie asks, trying to keep the astonishment out of his voice.

“Yeah, duh, does your mommy make you go to bed at seven?” Richie mocks as he climbs down the ladder and launches himself onto the bottom bunk, bouncing a couple of the items Eddie had laid out. “What’s this shit? You planning for a heart attack, Eds?”

“I just wanted to make sure I have everything,” Eddie says, starting to gather the stuff back up and put it away. “I’ve never been to the forest. I don’t know what’s going to happen. I have to be prepared.”

“Is that why you’re holding your inhaler in your hand?” Richie grabs it and tosses it into the air. “I have to be prepared,” he imitates. 

“You can laugh all you want right now but if I die you have to deal with it,” Eddie insists, snatching his inhaler back.

“Then don’t die on me, Eddie Spaghetti. You wanna play a game?”

“Sure, but I gotta brush my teeth first and take my medicine,” he says, frowning at his watch. He reaches for his pill organizer, opening up the ‘Friday’ box and taking out the pills. “Is the sink water clean? My mom said it might not be clean ‘cause it might just be unfiltered water from the lake.”

“I’ve been drinking it all my life and I never got sick,” Richie answers with a shrug. “I’ll show you.”

Richie’s parents are in the kitchen with a few cans of beer open when they open the door, but they don’t acknowledge the boys as they get two glasses of water. Eddie downs his pills, and Richie shows him to the bathroom, where they both brush their teeth. 

A few loud games of Scattergories and a round or two of Monopoly later, they shut the lights off and get into their beds. Eddie smashes his ear plugs between his fingers and stuffs them into his ears, lulling the room into silence. (it’s cold as fuck in here, he thinks primly, pulling the quilt around him tighter, wishing he had brought a blanket from home)

He turns over onto his other side and takes a breath. 

(how come richie invited me over someone else? isn’t he best friends with stan, and doesn’t he like bill better than me anyway? bill is a lot cooler than me, he always thinks of the best stuff to do, and stan is more fun since he doesn’t have to take medicine and carry an inhaler around and all that. maybe stan and bill both couldn’t make it and i was the third choice, but really, it’s a miracle mom even let me come at all)

He shoves himself against the wall, hoping that will offer him a modicum of warmth, and pulls the blanket even tighter around his shoulders. At least he put socks on to go to bed.

(it’s so quiet, i can hear my heart beating, i don’t like it)

Eddie’s mother had insisted on the ear plugs. She’d told him he wouldn’t be able to sleep with the noise of the water and Richie snoring. 

(i don’t even know if richie even snores in the first place)

He flops around a little more, listening to his own uneasy thoughts. Then, after a while, he makes an executive decision. Pulls the ear plugs out of his ears and holds them both in his fist. 

He can hear the lake, but it’s distant, and it’s quiet. Beyond that, it’s a light breeze through the heavy trees that surround the small cabin. But the thing he can hear the most is Richie’s breathing. He doesn’t snore, but his sleeping breaths come loudly.

Eddie nestles himself into the pillow and pulls the blanket up to his chin. He tunes his ears into Richie’s breathing. Within moments, he manages to fall asleep.

+

"I'm gonna fall off!" Eddie screams the next day.

"You're not gonna fall off," Richie yells over the whir of the motor boat and the rush of the waves and wind. "Just hold on, dumbass!"

"I'm gonna fall off and die!" Eddie screams. He's holding so tightly to the inner tube's handles, his knuckles have gone white. 

Richie pictures it. Imagines Eddie going flying into the lake, his small frame getting sucked down like a skipping stone. Pulling air into his lungs, Richie heaves himself toward his friend and cinches an arm around his back, pressing it against his life jacket, catching hold of the handle on the other side. "You're not gonna die! I got you!"

He can feel Eddie shivering. Water splashes at both of them, pelting them unevenly. The trees whir past. Not like Richie can really see them anyway, having left his glasses on the boat so they wouldn't fly off and get lost in the lake.

"I told you you wouldn't die," Richie tells Eddie as the boat slows a moment later.

"Yeah, well, we could've died, I could've gotten thrown off," Eddie says.

They've come to a complete stop now. Without the tension and speed of the boat, the inner tube starts to pull downward into the glassy lake water. 

(i could probably move my arm now 'cause he's not gonna fall off now, richie thinks. but he doesn't move.)

Richie's mom starts pulling the rope toward the boat. Eddie still shivers under Richie's arm.

"You have fun?" Richie asks him.

"Yeah. You?"

"Yeah. We went so fast, it was like CRASH and the trees were blurry and the water kept getting me in the eyes but it was awesome."

(it’s so much better with two people, richie can’t help but think; it helps weigh the tube down so i don’t just flop around and there’s someone to talk to and have fun with)

The tube gently bumps into the boat's back motor. They grab onto the boat and pull themselves up, and Richie grabs a pair of towels. He puts one over Eddie's shoulders.

The four of them get off the boat a little while later, heading up to the cabin for lunch and a break. When they make it back to the boat, it's nearly sunset.

"You boys wanna get back on that tube?" Richie's dad asks, cracking open what must be his seventh beer of the day as they patter away from the rickety dock of the old Tozier family cabin.

"Yeah, we gotta, but go faster this time," Richie says. He grabs a life jacket and clips it on. "And don't go over other boats' bumpy waves or we'll get thrown off. I saw some kids get thrown off a different boat's tube earlier and they got like ten feet of air before they went under.”

"You could get a bruise from that kind of fall. Take your glasses off or they'll get lost," Eddie instructs, unzipping his fanny pack, which he'd left on the seat of the boat. "Put them in here."

Richie does as he says, and once they both have life jackets on, the tube gets thrown back onto the water and them with it. 

"It's colder now, we're gonna get hypothermia," Eddie complains.

"What, is it too scary for you? Don't be a baby."

"Don't be an asshole," Eddie returns.

"Don't be a bitch."

"Don't be a piece of shit."

The boat picks up speed, and they hang on tight. It's choppy out now, since nightfall has brought about a little more wind-- but the lake is empty, save for a couple of old people in a canoe. They skid along easily for a minute or two.

"I got water in my ears," Eddie shouts.

"You baby!" Richie yells back, his words garbled by a faceful of water. He adjusts his grip on the rough rope handles. 

The boat whips suddenly to one side-- the side Richie is on, which he's glad for, considering what a tiny dumb baby Eddie is being about this whole thing. He screams right into Richie's ear. (has he even ever been inner tubing before? at least i know how to fucking hold on damn)

They pick up speed, skidding over the churning water unsteadily. The boat shifts again, turning sharply in the other direction-- Eddie's side-- and he gets thrown.

Richie scrambles to turn around. The boat slows to a stop.

(oh fuck he really didn't wanna get thrown he was bitching about it the whole time he's probably having an asthma attack under there he’s probably gonna suffocate and i bet he got covered in bruises from the whole)

But then, Eddie's head bobs up out of the dark water. His hair is plastered to his forehead. And he's laughing.

Relieved, Richie relaxes. He smiles. He can't help but laugh too as Eddie swims toward the tube and clamors back on and flops down next to him, breathless, dripping. They stay like this for a moment or two, laughing, gasping for air, cold-- but somehow feeling incredibly free.

+

“Are you done yet?” Richie huffs, throwing his frisbee at a tree again.

“Sunscreen is important. Do you want me to get a sun burn? Then I could get skin cancer and if I got cancer I might die,” Eddie says as he applies his second layer. (really richie you should put some on it could save you a lot of hurt down the road, eddie thinks, but at the same time, he thinks this too: richie is lucky his mom doesn’t make him do stuff like this so much)

“I put it on my face and my neck,” Richie says, running to collect the frisbee. “I wanna go swimming! Hurry up!”

“I wanna go swimming too. I’m almost done.”

“We should make s’mores again tonight,” Richie suggests, taking his thick glasses off and setting them down on a beach towel next to Eddie’s fanny pack.

(eddie had never had a s’more until last night’s post-inner tubing camp fire. it was delicious, and roasting the marshmallow with richie was fun, but it was so goddamn sticky he could hardly even enjoy it)

“Sure,” he says, screwing the cap back on the sunscreen. “I’m ready to swim now.”

“Race you to the water!” 

He runs after Richie, a little pissed off about his friend’s head start. He splashes into the water only a second after Richie, though. He’s always been fast. 

“Ahhh! It’s cold!” Eddie shouts.

“You get used to it!” Richie throws himself face-first into the water, laughing a little as he goes. “One time I was here with my aunt and uncle and my cousins and one of my cousins pooped in the lake. He put a life jacket on and he jumped off the dock and he just took a shit right in the water! It floated up and we watched it float away for so long. It was crazy. The craziest thing I ever saw. He just did it right in front of all of us and he didn’t even care.”

“That’s disgusting,” Eddie says as he makes it waist-deep. “How old was he?”

“Like eight or nine. Our parents told us all to play outside so we weren’t supposed to go back in so he didn’t wanna ask to go to the bathroom. Also, he probably kinda wanted to take a shit in the lake because that’s kinda cool.”

“I would never take a shit in the lake,” Eddie says primly. He forces himself in another few inches, recoiling a little as Richie’s residual splashes hit his skin.

“I dunno, I might if the circumstances were right,” Richie says. “It was hilarious when he did it so I wouldn’t not do it. But I wouldn’t just go for it balls deep like he did. He’s a maniac, I’m tellin’ you.” He puts on a chunky southern accent. “Down at the bayou, I say, we would do stuff like that all the time in my boyhood ‘cause we ain’t had no other options.”

As he usually does, Eddie ignores the poorly executed voice. “That’s so gross though. You don’t even know what’s gonna happen to your poop.”

“You don’t know what’s gonna happen to your poop when you drop one in the toilet.”

“Yes I do. I flush it down the pipes and it ends up in the sewers and then eventually it washes out to the oceans,” Eddie says. “Then it dissolves into the water and it’s gone.”

“But it’s your DNA out in the open.”

“Poop doesn’t have DNA.”

“Yeah huh,” Richie insists.

“Nuh uh.”

“Yeah huh.”

“No it doesn’t. It’s not skin or hair or a finger nail, it’s like if you spit. If you just spit nobody can tell if it was me or you,” Eddie asserts.

“You wanna mix our spit and find out?”

“That sounds disgusting,” Eddie dismisses. “I like my spit in my own mouth, unmixed with other people’s spit, thanks.”

“You’re no fun.” Richie slams himself back into the freezing lake water, splashing Eddie once again.

“Stop splashing me! I don’t wanna get hypothermia, I have to go in slow,” Eddie shouts at him as he bobs back up.

“Is that right? I’m Eddie Kaaaaaaaaaaspbrak and I gotta go in slooooow,” Richie whines, splashing Eddie again.

“I don’t wanna get hypothermia,” Eddie repeats.

Richie grabs Eddie’s thin shoulders and dunks him down under the water. “Now who has hypothermia!”

“You piece of shit!” Fumbling a little, wet hair flopping over his forehead, Eddie shoves at Richie’s chest. Richie lets himself fall into the water, laughing as he goes. He pulls Eddie down with him. 

They wrestle in the water a little, laughing, shivering.

“Say your prayers,” Richie says in the deepest voice he can muster. “This is your last day earthside, punk.”

“If you kill me I’ll come back as a ghost and I’ll haunt you,” Eddie threatens, trying to shove Richie down again.

“No! Such! Thing!” Richie yells.

Eddie shoves at him harder, and Richie’s knees buckle under the water; he goes down, which is about what he was expecting, but then;

(ouch fuck ouch god dammit fuck ouch)

“Ahh! Ow,” he complains, pulling himself up on his left foot, lifting his right leg. He leans a hand on Eddie’s shoulder so he can take a look at it. “Eddie Spaghetti! You pushed me right into a rock.”

“Shit, are you okay?” Eddie asks, the familiar worry taking shape between his dark eyebrows. He takes Richie by the ankle and looks at his foot. “You’re bleeding! We gotta clean it up. But you can’t walk in the sand or you’ll get sand in it. Here, just hold onto me and hop on one foot and then I’ll bring you a towel,” Eddie instructs.

Far be it for Richie to argue with Eddie-- he goes along with the plan. Waits at the shore line, propped up on one foot, while Eddie drags a beach towel over. Once it’s in place, he hops to it and flops down.

“Stay there,” Eddie says. “I’ll get my stuff from the cabin. Don’t move. Put pressure on it with the corner of the towel.”

(it’s not even bleeding that bad, richie thinks; usually with a cut like this he’d just ignore it and move on with his life, but if eddie thinks it needs to be cleaned up, he guesses it needs to be cleaned up)

He watches Eddie run off, barefoot, toward the cabin. Watches him disappear into it.

It’s like worlds colliding, seeing one of his friends from Derry at the family cabin. Usually it’s just him and his parents, and he’s being told to be quiet, to go play someplace else, to stop getting into trouble. Or it’s him and his cousins, and they’re shooting him those telltale annoyed looks like most other kids at school. It’s doubly weird as he watches Eddie Kaspbrak hurry out of his family cabin, a moment later, clutching some medical supplies in his small hands.

“Okay, I got alcohol wipes and a waterproof bandage,” Eddie says as he sits next to Richie in the sand. “It’s gonna hurt so hold your breath.”

With a color of confidence Richie has only ever really seen Eddie wear when he’s getting them un-lost form someplace or another, Eddie goes about cleaning the cut. It stings like a motherfucker, but Richie manages not to cringe or cry out. 

“Good job,” Eddie says as he finishes cleaning it. “Now I just gotta dry it so the bandaid will stick.” He uses an un-bloodied corner of the towel and blots the area gingerly. Dabs all the moisture off. It’s still bleeding bright red, but he quickly gets a bandaid over it tight, so the blood stops. Richie watches him, calmly, quietly, still.

“There you go,” Eddie says, wiping his hands off on the towel. “All better.”

“You gonna kiss it for me?” Richie teases instead of saying ‘thanks’.

“Ew. No. I’m not kissing your ankle,” Eddie says as he stands up. He makes a face. “But I will race you back into the water.”

+

(imagine thinking s’mores are too sticky what the fuck can’t even imagine it the sticky is half the fun ‘cause then you got sticky fingers and you can threaten your cousins with your sticky fingers or if your cousins aren’t around you can use them to trap ants until your mom catches you and gets mad)

Richie glances over his shoulder. His parents have gone on an evening walk along the beach, and by all the Kid Logic Eddie and Richie could come up with, they shouldn’t be back for a while. They’d timed it perfectly; waited around ten minutes after Mr. and Mrs. Tozier had left to make sure they were good and gone, but that it wasn’t too late so they boys would be caught. Also, Eddie is in fact keeping lookout. 

(should’ve been me on look out that kid is useless he can’t distract anyone other than me what a dummy also even if he fakes an asthma attack my parents won’t know what to do so they’ll just probably try to get me to take care of him oh shit i hope eddie spaghetti doesn’t actually have an asthma attack while i’m over here oh well guess he can handle himself anyway uhhhhhhh how many beers are left)

He kicks open the cooler with his Converse’d toe, making a karate chop sound effect as he does. Counts twelve loose cans of beer left. This is the fourth day since they left Derry; they’re leaving tomorrow. If his dad even opens the cooler again to get another beer, he won’t notice one missing, since he’s already been drinking all day. And the boat is all tied up and covered so he won’t need any more boat beers-- that’s when Mr. Tozier gets his serious drinking done. He won’t notice if twelve turns into eleven.

(stop being a bitch and just take one)

Richie snaches a can, closes the cooler, and stuffs it into Eddie’s fanny pack, which he’d emptied and clipped around his waist just for this purpose. He books it around to the front of the cabin, the can sloshing around and hitting his left hip bone as he goes. Once he catches sight of his friend, he slows to an exaggerated moonwalk.

“The eagle has landed,” he says very seriously.

His dark brows mashed together a little, Eddie nods. “Let’s go to the spot, then.”

“After you, seeen-yor.”

“I don’t know where it is, dumbass,” Eddie points out.

“After me, then, seeeeeeeen-yor.”

“Stop calling me señor. Is it supposed to be funny? Do you even know what it means?”

(not really)

“Fuck yes I do, because I’m cultured,” Richie shouts as he leads Eddie toward the spot he’d had in mind-- a little upwards dip behind the cabin, surrounded in trees; a perfect vantage point to see when his parents returned, but remain unseen by them should they approach. They climb up to it easily and sit on the soft forest floor, wedged between two fat trees.

“I hope there aren’t mosquitoes out here,” Eddie complains. “It’s getting dark.”

“There aren’t mosquitos out here,” Richie says very somberly. “But what they do have is vampire bats. A shit ton of them. And they’re so thirsty for your anemic blood, Eds. They just crave the stuff. All year they sit in their little bat schools going, gee, I hope Eddie Kaspbrak comes this summer so we can feast on his delicious delicious anemic blood.”

“Go to hell,” Eddie suggests.

“Go to hell,” Richie mocks, loudly, stupidly. He cracks the beer open.

Before he can take a sip, though, he hears his parents talking. Hears his mother complaining about her sister.

“Oh, fuck,” Eddie whispers, his brown eyes going wide. “They’re gonna catch us!”

“No they aren’t. Play it cool. Be quiet.”

Both boys lean in close, peeking out the little gap between their cover trees. Richie holds the open can of beer carefully behind his back so the moonlight or the light from the cabin won’t glint off the silver. They watch Richie’s parents go inside for a moment, then come out, taking seats on the deck-- only a handful of feet in front of their hiding spot.

“God dammit Richie,” Eddie huffs. “Why’d you have to open it? We could have put it back in my fanny pack and gone inside but now we’re trapped out here with contraband. If your parents find out and they tell my mom, she’ll never ever let me see you again as long as I live.”

“Shut up. I got it under control. They won’t even know we’re here,” Richie whispers back. “It’s fine. Just be quiet.”

“I’m not worried about me being quiet,” Eddie whispers, somehow making his puppy dog eyes even wider. “I’m scared about you being quiet! You’ve never been quiet a day in your life! You probably don’t even know what the word quiet means! If you look up quiet in the dictionary, it probably says under the definition, ‘impossible until Richard Tozier is dead’!”

“I can be quiet, asswipe,” Richie whisper yells. He takes an unnecessarily large gulp of the beer.

(ew ew ew ew oh my god what the fuck ew why is it so bitter how does anyone like this)

“Hits the spot, Eddie Spaghetti! Your turn,” he says, handing Eddie the can, doing a very good job of pretending he liked it. “Haha, wow, I already feel buzzed.”

Eddie takes a delicate sip of it. Then, hesitantly, he follows it with a second, even smaller sip.

“I feel buzzed too,” Eddie says.

“The way you’re holding the can, Eds, you might as well have your damn pinky out! Are you going to tea with the queen of England after this? Chip chip cheerio! Gimme some.” Richie takes the can out of Eddie’s small hands and takes another gulp, figuring if he drinks enough at a time, it’ll go down faster and it won’t taste as bad. He gags a little bit as he hands it back to Eddie.

“You better not have mouth germs or backwash,” Eddie warns, ignoring Richie’s standup comedy routine as usual. “When’s the last time you brushed your teeth?”

“Brush my teeth? What does that mean? I’ve never heard of that.”

“Shut the fuck up, that’s disgusting,” Eddie pouts. He takes another small sip from the can. Then he frowns at it a little, and starts to bring it to his mouth again-- but he stops, looking very concerned. “Richie. This is icky, right? I don’t like it at all.”

“It’s… yeah, it’s pretty rank,” Richie admits, wiping his face with the back of his hand. 

“I don’t wanna drink any more. It tastes like stomach acid.”

“It’s too bitter. It’s like drinking piss. I dunno how my dad likes ‘em so much.” Richie picks up a stick off the forest floor and snaps it into four pieces, throwing them each at a nearby tree.

“That ruins the whole plan though,” Eddie whispers. “If it’s not empty we can’t put it in my fanny pack to throw away later.”

“If we pour it out, my parents will hear,” Richie argues.

“Pour it out and pretend you have to tinkle,” Eddie suggests.

“Tinkle? Pretend I have to _tinkle_?” Richie laughs, covering his mouth to keep quiet. He’s smiling so big, his cheeks push his glasses upward.__

_ _ “Yes. Just do it.”_ _

_ _ “I’ll pretend I have to piss, but I’ve never had to _tinkle_ in my life so I wouldn’t know how to pretend to do that!”_ _

_ _ “Shhh!” Eddie scolds._ _

_ _ Once he gets a hold on himself, Richie stands up, faces away from where his still-oblivious parents are seated, and carefully dumps the can out from fly-level. He shakes the drips off it._ _

_ _ “It’s gonna be too loud if we crunch it up,” Eddie whispers, standing up and brushing himself off. “Let’s just put it in whole and crunch it up inside.”_ _

_ _ “That’s what your mom said to me last night.”_ _

_ _ Eddie makes a face, but ignores the jab. He takes the can and zips it away into his fanny pack, which Richie is still wearing. “How do we go back without them catching us?”_ _

_ _ “It doesn’t matter if they catch us, dumbass, it just matters that they don’t know we had a beer,” Richie whispers. “Just be cool.”_ _

_ _ (bad advice rich this loser has never been cool a day in his life, you’ll have to be cool enough for the both of you)_ _

_ _ “What if they ask what’s in the fanny pack?” Eddie asks, crossing his arms over his polo. “What if they can smell the beer? I can smell the beer! They’re gonna smell it and we’re gonna be in trouble and then we’re fucked ‘cause your mom will tell my mom! Richie, if my mom finds out, I’m fucked and so are you. Your parents might just ground you for a week or take away your comic books or something but my mom will--” he cuts himself off, wheezing a little._ _

_ _ “Where the fuck’s your inhaler?” Richie asks._ _

_ _ “It’s-- not-- I emptied-- my fanny pack-- for the beer,” Eddie says, wheezing a lot now, holding onto his chest. “Can’t breathe!”_ _

_ _ “Come on, you dork,” Richie says, grabbing Eddie by the arm._ _

_ _ (fuck i never should have let him come outside without his inhaler i should have known oh god i’m gonna kill him aren’t i)_ _

_ _ (richie has never actually thought of eddie spaghetti as being nearly as delicate as his mom treats him but the kid actually does have seriously bad asthma right so this is like an actual problem)_ _

_ _ He picks up their pace, dragging Eddie along, and eventually he yanks Eddie through the back door. His parents for sure notice, but they don’t react much._ _

_ _ “Sit down,” Richie demands once they’re inside, shoving Eddie onto the couch. “I’ll get it.”_ _

_ _ “Hurry,” Eddie gasps. _ _

_ _ Richie hurries. Makes a mess of their room looking for it, but manages to find it pretty quick. He runs back; Eddie is still clutching his chest, his shoulders heaving a little, making those awful gasping sounds._ _

_ _ Richie holds it to his mouth. With a shaky hand, Eddie presses down on it, releasing the medicine. He puffs it again, his hand around Richie’s, before he relaxes. _ _

_ _ “Thanks,” he says, still breathing a little heavily. He puts the inhaler in his pocket._ _

_ _ “Would’ve been really annoying if you died or passed out or whatever,” Richie says, shrugging like it’s nothing. “But, like, we do actually smell like beer, so we should go to bed so my parents won’t find out.”_ _

_ _

_ _+_ _

_ _

_ _ In the morning, the four of them pack the Tozier family car back up. Mostly-empty cooler, duffel bags, leftover groceries, cardboard box of bug spray and sunscreen and towels and flashlights and whatever else. Then they pack themselves into the car too, Richie’s dad driving, his mom in the passenger seat, Richie on the left in the back, Eddie next to him on the right, a few leftover snacks and a just-in-case plastic bag on the middle seat between them._ _

_ _ Eddie watches out the window as the trees pass them by. Watches as they turn back onto the highway to begin the three hour trek back to Derry. _ _

_ _ He runs through the trip in his mind. Survived inner tubing four separate times. Only fell off once. Survived the fall. Survived eating food someone else’s mom cooked. Survived sleeping without the ear plugs his mom had insisted he needed. Managed to avoid cuts, scrapes, bug bites, and sunburns. Didn’t get poisoned from the lake water. Didn’t get hypothermia. Only two asthma attacks; one teeny tiny, one medium. _ _

_ _ Without thinking about it, Eddie’s glance shifts from the window on his right to the kid on his left. _ _

_ _ (it’s possible that maybe richie ‘trashmouth’ tozier is a good luck charm, he hears himself thinking; after all, stranger things have happened)_ _

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!!!  
please drop a comment and some kudos if you liked it :) more it 2017-19 fics are on their way!!!!!!!! feel free to request smth specific at my tumblr golden-geese :)  
this fic takes place in the same fic universe as my upcoming series, but the two can be read/appreciated separately, there might just be a little extra fun for those who read both :)


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